Now that Futuremark has released a new update for 3DMark which brings 3DMark API Overhead benchmark, AMD was quite keen to show some performance figures on its Radeon R9 290X graphics card, as well as performance scaling on the octa-core FX-8370 CPU.

The new API Overhead benchmark update for 3DMark actually compares draw calls on different APIs, comparing DirectX 11, DirectX 12 and Mantle APIs on a single system. AMD followed Futuremark's notes saying that the API Overhead benchmark should not be used to compare GPUs from different vendors and has only showed the draw call throughput between DirectX 11 and DirectX 12 on Radeon R9 290X and the R7 260X graphics cards.

The upcoming DirectX 12 API will also have a certain impact on performance scaling on multi-threaded CPUs. With the octa-core FX-8370 CPU AMD managed to get DirectX 12 to scale with up to six cores, while DirectX 11 is limited to two cores.

While it is nice to see that AMD's hardware works well with DirectX 12 and that we can see some rather impressive performance gains, bear in mind that these are still just synthetic benchmarks and real-world performance is usually something completely different. Of course, the numbers do look quite promising and there are plenty of things to look forward with the release of DirectX 12 and DirectX 12 games, which should be ready by the end of this year.

Futuremark has released a new 3DMark update with the new API Overhead feature test, meant to measure the difference in DirectX 11, DirectX 12 and Mantle API performance.

The new API Overhead feature test for 3DMark was developed with input from AMD, Nvidia, Intel, Microsoft and other members of the Futuremark Benchmark Development program and compares the relative performance of DirectX 11, DirectX 12 and Mantle on a single system.

Since the new API Overhead feature test is not a general-purpose GPU benchmark, according to Futuremark, it should not be used to compare graphics card from different vendors as Futuremark is promising a DirectX 12 benchmark with game-like workloads, which should be available after the public launch of Windows 10 OS.

According to Futuremark, API overhead is quite important and with the recent talk that new graphics APIs let developers get "close to the metal", something that we have seen with AMD's Mantle API and will see with DirectX 12. Lower overhead can be achieved by making better use of multi-core CPUs, which eliminates software bottlenecks, especially with draw calls.

Futuremark explained that these draw calls occur when the CPU tells the GPU to draw an object on the screen and with game typically making thousand of draw calls per frame, these also create performance-limiting overhead for the CPU. With the ever rising number of draw calls, graphics engines are limited by API performance and the result of the new test shows the maximum number of draw calls per second by each API before the frame rate drops below 30 FPS.

In order to run the new 3DMark API Overhead feature-set DirectX 12 test you'll need up-to-date Windows 10 Technical Preview (build 10041 or later), 4GB of RAM, and DirectX feature level 11_0 graphics card. For the Mantle test, you'll need 4GB of RAM and, of course, AMD GPU with support for Mantle API, while the DirectX 11 test also needs 4GB of RAM and DirectX feature level 11_0 hardware with at least 1GB of VRAM.

The new 3DMark update v1.5.884 also fixes a bug that could cause the Sky Diver demo to hang at the cave entrance scene as well as adds some other minor updates.

The API Overhead feature test is available now in the latest version of 3DMark Advanced Edition and 3DMark Professional Edition while the Steam version of 3DMark updates automatically. Unfortunately, it is not available for the free 3DMark Basic Edition or the Steam demo.

AMD was busy this week, as it announced the Carrizo APU, Samsung FreeSync monitors and it used the opportunity to speak about the next update to Mantle API technology.

Richard Huddy, AMD Chief Gaming Officer, delivered an update on the state of Mantle. He used a nice description of Mantle in his presentation stating that "Mantle is a driver with the AMD Catalyst software suite that lets applications speak directly to the Graphics Core Next architecture." Of course, your game needs to support Mantle and you need to have the right GPU and drivers for it.

The latest addition to ever expanding list of Mantle supperters is Capcom with its Panta-Rhei engine.

AMD is telling the world that there are four engines and 20+ launched or upcoming titles, and 10 developers publically announced their support for Mantle. There are close to 100 registered developers in the Mantle beta program.

The Frostbite 3 engine (Battlefield Hardline), CryEngine (Crysis series), Nitrous Engine (Star Citizen) and Asura Engine (Sniper elite) currently have support for Mantle. Some top games including Thief and Sid Meir’s Civilization Beyond Earth also support Mantle.

Dragon Age Inquisition from Bioware, Battlefield Hardline and Star Citizen Mustang Omega Variant Racer support Mantle out of the box and should be launching soon.

Mantle can increase the frame rate in certain scenarios by up to 66 percent, but you do need a combination of a mainstream CPU and high-end graphics to see the biggest benefits. In end effect, Mantle can save you money that you planned for CPU upgrade, but it will be supported in dozen games, at least for now.

Mantle is a nice addition to the Radeon line-up and it is nice to have feature for people who have Radeon graphics in their gaming machines. It looks like there are more titles to come and there will be more games to support this low level access graphics feature coming in 2015.

AMD has announced that three new developers have jumped on the Mantle API train, Cloud Imperium Games, Eidos-Montréal, a part of the Square Enix Group, and Oxide Games. These three will join DICE and hopefully, for AMD's sake, push the Mantle API to become a new popular API on the block.

In case you missed it back in September when it was announced during the GPU'13 press conference, AMD's Mantle API is a new low-level API that should provide PC game developers an experience similar to the one on consoles. It will allow them to have a direct access to GPU features, rendering techniques and reduce CPU overhead, all on GCN-based GPUs. Although consoles are nowhere near the PC in terms of performance, games on consoles usually perform much better, mostly thanks to a low overhead OS that allows developer to pull a lot of hardware resources, while PCs are overwhelmed with complex APIs, OS and complex drivers.

Cloud Imperium Games developer will use the Mantle API in its "Star Citizen", a crowd-funded PC space simulator with legendary game designer Chris Roberts behind the wheel. According to Roberts, AMD's Mantle will allow them to extract more performance from AMD Radeon GPU than any other graphics API, which should be quite important considering that a game like Star Citizen is being designed with the need for massive GPU horsepower.

Eidos-Montréal is currently working on a new Thief game title, which is a first-person stealth adventure game set for release in February 2014. David Anfossi, studio head, Eidos-Montréal noted that Mantle lets them use AMD Radeon GPUs "the way they are meant to be used" (pun probably intended), unlocking many new opportunities and increased CPU and GPU performance.

Last but not the least is Oxide Games with its new "Nitrous" engine for 64-bit, multi-core processors. Dan Baker, co-founder of Oxide Games noted that AMD's Mantle technology lets them get more out of the hardware than any other solution available.

DICE was already backing up the Mantle API from day one and its Battlefield 4 will be one of the first games to feature it, at least when DICE issues the promised patch.

All three new developers will join DICE and speak about Mantle API architecture and implementation at the AMD Developer Summit scheduled for November 11th.

In a recent blog post Microsoft confirmed what many in the industry suspected all along – the Xbox One does not directly support AMD’s new API. Microsoft clearly stated that Direct3D is still going strong and that Direct3D 11 is the way to go for Xbox One development.

“The Xbox One graphics API is “Direct3D 11.x” and the Xbox One hardware provides a superset of Direct3D 11.2 functionality. Other graphics APIs such as OpenGL and AMD’s Mantle are not available on Xbox One,” said Microsoft.

So what does AMD have to say for itself? Well, it’s a bit tricky. AMD admits Redmond’s new console does not exactly support Mantle, as the new API is supposed to be exclusive to PCs. However, AMD points out that Mantle creates a PC development environment that’s similar to consoles. It’s not meant to work the other way around.

“By creating a more console-like developer environment, Mantle: improves time to market; reduces development costs; and allows for considerably more efficient rendering, improving performance for gamers,” tweeted AMD. “The console connection is made because next-gen uses Radeon, so much of the programming they’re doing for the consoles are already well-suited to a modern Radeon architecture on the desktop; that continuum is what allows Mantle to exist.”

In other words, AMD insists Mantle is just for PCs, but it argues that it would be pointless on consoles anyway. Mantle is supposed to help PCs cut overhead, which is something console devs don’t need to worry about anyway. The hardware is similar and that's what Mantle is supposed to exploit.

A lot has been said about Mantle over the last couple of weeks, AMD’s new API has a fair share of supporters, but detractors are not lacking either.

One of the biggest concerns voiced by industry watchers was the apparent lack of support for the new API from leading developers. Sure, DICE and EA are on board, but the rest of the industry didn’t appear to be on board.

There seems to be a very good reason for that. According to Forbes, DICE and EA have a “timed exclusivity agreement from a PR standpoint.” However, AMD told Forbes that several more developers should be announced in November, at AMD’s APU 13 conference.

EA currently has more than 15 Frostbite games in development, with Mantle support. These include big titles like new instalments of NFS, Command and Conquer, Mass Effect and Mirror’s Edge.

AMD is promising “several” new developers at APU 13, but who are they? Are they big or small players? If we were to speculate, we’re place our bets on somewhat bigger developers with a big footprint on the console scene, but we’ll just have to wait and see.

Mantle is the new AMD API that sits side by side with OpenGL and DirectX and offers an alternative. In theory it should provide much faster performance and more direct access to the "metal" or the chip itself.

Since AMD has three console win where PlayStation 4 and Xbox One are the two dominant ones, Mantle is more important than ever as a positive performance boost PC games has a good chance to translating into performance gains on the console version of the game, and vice versa of course.

We have spent some time talking to people close to the matter, both from EA/ DICA and AMD and we have learned that both parties anticipate a significant performance boost with the Mantle version of BF 4.

DICE and EA have already said that the patch to enable mantle is expected in December timeframe and there might be a demo showcase a bit earlier. Have in mind that AMD has developer summit starting on November 11th and we would be surprised if we don’t hear more details about Mantle.

We actually have confirmation from high ranking people at AMD’s graphics division that this conference is the venue where AMD plans to reveal more info on its new API. The eyes of the developer and gaming world are pointed towards Mantle as this might be the biggest change in PC gaming and console development in more than a decade.

At the same time, it might be just a marketing thing, but we will give AMD a chance and wait for some numbers before we draw any conclusion. Mantle sounds like a great thing, but let's see how it performs and have in mind that Microsoft is definitely not the biggest supporter of Mantle as it goes against its beloved DirectX 11 API that has been around for years now.

AMD’s Hawaii even dragged on for hours and that is perhaps our only complaint – there was too much stuff, it was too damn long. For some reason AMD left the best for last. The consumerish stuff was shown off first, new cards, some audio tech and new games.

But Mantle was for some reason reserved for the end of the presentation. So what’s the big deal about Mantle? Well AMD describes it as a low-level high-performance console-style graphics API for PC. That is a mouthful, but basically it is an API designed to tie in all AMD GCN products, which allows developers to speed up development for both consoles and PC titles. You can think of Mantle as the native language of GCN. This approach offers some very obvious advantages. With Mantle, AMD can leverage its console design wins and make development for all GCN products easier, from consoles, through APUs to Radeons and even FirePro cards.

AMD’s graphics guru Raja Koduri pointed out that Mantle also deliver massive performance gains, allowing devs to tap more power from GCN. In some cases, it could result in a nine-fold boost, practically bringing 2018-level performance to current generation graphics hardware.

Of course, to put theory into practice AMD needs support from all sorts of developers. DICE is the first company to support Mantle with its Frostbite 3 engine. Battlefield 4 will support Mantle as of December, allowing us to see whether AMD’s promises will live up to real world tests.

Frostbite 3 will render natively with Mantle on Windows, dropping DirectX 11 in favour of AMD’s new API. AMD says Mantle will allow perfect parallel rendering and allow the system to use all eight CPU cores. It will also deliver low CPU overhead rendering and avoid bottlenecking the GPU. On the GPU side, it will provide developers with full access to graphics hardware and allow them to come up with lots of low-level optimisations.

It is still too early to pass judgment, but Mantle looks very promising. It will take a couple of years before we see what AMD manages to make off it, but if it gains enough support from developers it could be a very big deal indeed. It looks like a win-win proposition for everyone other than Nvidia. Mantle should make developers’ lives a bit easier, while at the same time providing AMD hardware with a significant performance boost.

Notice that we said hardware – not GPUs. In fact, the CPU bit shouldn’t be overlooked. AMD appears to have gone to great lengths to put eight-core processors to good use, which is hardly surprising as new consoles feature eight AMD x86 cores. But on the PC side, this could also make AMD’s relatively affordable FX-series parts a lot more appealing to gamers.

AMD is planning to hold its first software developers conference in Bellevue, Washington from June 13 to 16.

Dubbed AMD Fusion Developer Summit, the event will focus on educating developers on the advantages of AMD hardware, mainly its Fusion-series APUs. It is expected to attract about 400 programmers. In addition AMD is expected to announce some details about its upcoming GPUs.

Interestingly, ARM VP Jem Davies will be one of the keynote speakers and this fact is sure to prompt speculation about AMD’s possible partnership with the British chip designer. Talking to Tom’s Hardware, AMD’s John Taylor said that AMD is always looking into new technologies, but he also added that AMD’s stay focused on x86 parts.

AMD Graphics CTO Eric Demers pointed will also address the developers and explain the virtues of AMD’s APU approach, which can be used greatly speed up processing even beyond current APIs.

While Microsoft isn’t commenting, sources tell us that Microsoft will indeed release a Windows Software Development Kit (SDK) for Kinect this Spring. The project is said to be collaboration between the Interactive Entertainment Business unit and the Microsoft Research unit.

The SDK will give those interested in working with Kinect access to key parts of the Kinect technology to build applications that use the device. It is unclear if and how this will all work, as the whispers that we hear indicate that this is supposed to be a non-commercial endeavor, with a commercial version to arrive at some point in the future.

The SDK should really give those in the academic arena (as well as enthusiasts) the proper building blocks or APIs if you will, to create some very interesting applications for the device. Expect to hear more about the specifics of the Kinect SDK for Windows as we get closer to Spring; or even next month, if what we are hearing about the release is true.